A travel through time
by Nala Snape
Summary: Buffy and Spike find themselves in a past that now threatens their present. They have to work together to live through the dangers they have to face. This story is set sometime in season 5.
1. Chapter 1

_Disclaimer: Nothing is mine, it all belongs to Joss Whedon and ... well whoever owns the rights on Buffy TVS and Angel. _

_This is the translation of my German story I wrote about Buffy, and as a little warning I have to add that the translation is not finished. My Beta andI are working on it though :)_

_A very special Thank You to my Beta "Bone White Butterfly" for looking over my translation and for translating whole chapters on her own. _

**prologue**

"Say Spike, don't you have anything better to do than making my life harder than it already is?" Buffy staked the vampire she was facing off against and sent a searching look at the Billy-Idol-Wannabe. He hadn't left her alone during patrols for days now and had never failed to get in her way while fighting against demons and vampires.

"Not really, luv." The blond creature of the night smirked at the slayer and sent a stake through the vampire he had beaten to the ground. "But I really don't know why you're complaining so much; I'm taking a lot of work off your shoulders. I'm not making you so nervous that you can't concentrate on your work, am I?"

Buffy just rolled her eyes, turned around, and started to leave. After a few steps, she thought otherwise and turned to the vampire again. "You know, Spike, I just don't trust you. You wouldn't help me without expecting something in return. You never did, so why should I believe that suddenly you've started to now? So just say what you want, unless you want a stake through your heart."

"I don't want money, if that's what you're thinking." Her raised eyebrows told him that she didn't believe him. "I just need a certain degree of violence in the night. It's a kind of training before the day starts."

"Spike, it's eleven o'clock at night."

"Hello, vampire! I sleep days; during the night I wander around. Bloody hell, I thought a slayer knew those things. Maybe I should have a talk with Giles so he can create a new teaching plan for you."

"You think, you're funny, don't you?" She began to walk away again, knowing that Spike would follow her. His company got on her nerves, even though she couldn't exactly say why. It wasn't as if she had to look after him, as she had needed to with Riley only a few weeks ago. Spike was able to take care of himself – and even if not, so what? He was a vampire. It was not her problem if he died; he was already undead. It was true that he helped her with her job, but did he have to cling to her like a baby? "How about, you go to the northern part, and I patrol the southern part of the cemetrey. Then you can really help and not grate on my nerves with your presence."

Spike took an unnecessary breath after her words. He didn't want her to realize how her rejection hurt him. It was embarrassing enough already. This wish, this craving for her acceptance, was ridiculous. Only two years ago, he would have laughed at – and then killed – anybody who might have told him that, one day, he'd be thirsting for acknowledgement from the slayer. What was wrong with him? He'd just been a normal vampire. Then this piece of metal had been planted in his skull, but it shouldn't have made such a difference. But this chip had been in his brain for fourteen months, and it had been fourteen months since he had bitten his last human being and drank its warm, livegiving blood. He closed his eyes. That long faded memory was still enough to send him into raptures. It had happened fourteen months ago. It had been fourteen months since his entire existence had suddenly changed.

"I think you could show a little gratitude, slayer," he called after her, but she walked away nonetheless. "I did save your ass more than once, after all. Don't you remember, two weeks ago, when you fought that Fetschma demon? Without me, you'd have been..."

A sudden movement next to him made him stop talking.

"What's up, Spike, forgot you're vocabulary?" Buffy asked when he didn't go on. After he didn't answer her, she turned around to see the reason for his silence. He was standing frozen, paralysed with fear. She realized why when she saw the large, green ball of energy that had created itself right in front of him. Weirdly, it reminded her of a cartoon that she and Dawn had watched as children.

The ball of energy, a meter in diameter, floated above the ground. Buffy moved towards it slowly. Spike still was paralysed. He stared at the green light that hung suspended only inches in front of him as though mesmerized.

"Spike?" Buffy carefully tried to get his attention. She did not know why, but she was sure that they shouldn't touch that light. When there was no reaction from the vampire, she called his name again.

Meanwhile she had reached him, but he didn't seem to notice her. "Spike, come on!" Even as she was shouting his name, she wondered why she cared about what happened to him. No reaction. _'We've got to get out of here and get Giles,'_ she thought and reached for the vampire to pull him away from the field of energy.

She couldn't have said what hit her before she lost consciousness and was surrounded by sudden darkness.

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_Please leave a review and tell me if you liked it so far,_

_thanks, N.Snape_


	2. Kansas?

_This chapter was translated by my Beta Bone White Butterfly. Thank you :) _

**...Kansas?**

"Sir?" A faraway voice made its way slowly to his ears. "Sir, are you alright?" His aching head buzzed – an experience he had grown used to since the Chip had been put in his skull. Warily, he opened his eyes. At first he could see nothing, but the swimming shadows slowly took on contour and shape. He lay on the ground—gravel, it felt like—and kneeling over him was an anxious man in his forties who desperately needed to visit a barber. "I think he is coming to, Irene! How are you feeling?" The man helped Spike to sit up gingerly, though his eyes were focused elsewhere. Spike followed his gaze and spied a still form lying a few meters away.

"What…" began Spike, only to be immediately interrupted.

"You must have fallen, Sir. Were you and your wife robbed?"

Spike stared at the man with a look that said he hadn't understood a word he had just been told. And in all honesty, he hadn't. What was the blighter talking about? Damn it, and he had thought _he_ had problems coming out of his arse. Confused, and without answering the man's question, he climbed to his feet and tried to remember what had happened. As he stood, his eyes fell on who he assumed was Irene and on another woman who lay near her in the street.

"Buffy?" Having only just stood up on shaky legs, he toppled down into a kneeling position, conveniently near the Slayer. Being there, he went and tried to shake her awake. "Buffy, can you hear me?"

"She is unconscious yet, Sir," he was informed by the man who even now looked over Buffy and him anxiously. "Shall I have a doctor called for?"

Spike did not make the effort to answer the question. He took Buffy's hand and continued to talk to her. He decided not to analyze why the sight of her motionless face was playing with his insides. There would be enough time for that later, after she had awoken and made fun of the worried look that had somhow worked its way onto his face.

Just as Spike decided, despite his instincts, to accept the stranger's offer to send for a doctor, the Slayer started to come to.

"Buffy?" He helped her to sit up and slung an arm around her to support her back. "You all right, luv?"

He could follow every step of her passage into consciousness by watching her face. First there was complete disorientation, then bewilderment, which was followed by a sort of foggy cognition that suddenly fled in the face of horrified comprehension. In other words, the instant she realized whose body she was being supported on, she sprang up and blinked inquiringly—or rather, accusingly—at him.

"What in Hell is going on here, Spike?" Right then she noticed the couple that had witnessed the entire scene.

"Miss, are you certain you are well? Perhaps we should accompany you to a doctor. The thieves that robbed you must have been quite rough." It took a moment before Buffy noticed that something wasn't quite right. It wasn't just that the woman hovering near her spoke queerly; the more obvious answer to the 'what the Hell is wrong with this picture' question was that said woman's clothes belonged in a museum or costume party.

Spike cut in. "Ahm, no, many thanks, but I think my wife and I are fine, isn't that right, ah, Darling?" In the meantime, the Vampire had also picked up on the peculiarities. His goal was to lose the couple as quickly as possible. Now he only prayed that Buffy was thinking along the same lines and was smart enough to go along with his act.

"No, I think I'm fine, too." Some instinct convinced Buffy to play along with Spike's game. Something wasn't ringing true, and she wanted to find out what it was.

"In that case, my wife and I shall escort you to the next police station. The work of this thieving mob must be reported. …But how ill-bred and inconsiderate of me. We have not yet introduced ourselves. I am Sir Walter Brendall, and this is my wife Irene."

Perhaps it was the names, perhaps the way and manner in which Brendall spoke, or perhaps the atmosphere of the city, its familiar scent, its noises—he couldn't have said what it was. He just suddenly knew. His eyes widened, and, if it were possible, he grew paler than usual. London! His gaze left the Slayer to scan his surroundings. He found himself in London. And not in London at the beginning of the new millennium, but rather in the London of the late nineteenth century. A hand hesitantly tapping his arm woke him from his trance.

"Ah, please forgive me, where are my manners?" He sought to cover up his shock and let none of it show. "My name is William Atherby, and this is my wife Elisabeth." He offered Brendall his hand and nodded to the man's wife. Irene looked pityingly at the two of them. Spike almost laughed at the expression that formed on her face when eyed Buffy's clothing. Lady Brendall had obviously never seen such an outfit. She likely thought the less-than-knee length skirt and clingy top were undergarments. Unfortunately, his own clothing was glaringly conspicuous. He nonchalantly closed his leather duster in an attempt to hide or at least downplay his red shirt and his jeans.

"William Atherby? Oh, I know a William Atherby. Perhaps you are a relation. He lives not far from here in…"

"…Abbey Orchard," Spike finished the sentence in a near whisper. It had been decades since he last spoke that name aloud. When he noticed Buffy's questioning look, he moved on quickly. "We're cousins, to be precise." It was the best explanation he could come up with spontaneously. And with that lie, the whole situation became too much for him. Memories rolled over him. The wash of feelings at being here again was almost overpowering. He had to lose the couple.

"Sir Brendall, we really don't wish to hold you up any longer. It was very kind of you to help us, but you look as though you were on your way to some manner of celebration. Elisabeth and I will go on alone from here." He adopted an expression that would brook no argument.

"As a matter of fact, we were on the way to a party in the Underwood house. And if you are sure…" Brendall didn't need to finish the sentence, for Spike was already holding out his hand in farewell. He didn't want to give the man-about-town time to realize that helping his fellow man was more important than a social gala.

"Thank you for your help."

"It was nothing. And do say hello to your cousin for me. Mrs. Atherby." Buffy nodded to Brendall and breathed a sigh of relief once the pair was out of earshot.

"Bloody Hell!" cut Spike's voice through the quiet. He had the urgent need to destroy something, but the only things to be found along the damned park path were tiny pebbles.

"Spike…"

"Leave me alone!" he snarled.

She watched him stalk here and there, scowling darkly and practically shaking. He paced like a lion in a cage, a cage that she was unfortunate enough to be at the center of. He looked enraged and almost deranged, and she wasn't sure she liked this combination in William the Bloody.

"What's going on here, Spike? Just a second ago, we were standing in Sunnydale, a big, green ball of light blinked into existence, and—bang—I now get to quote one of the greatest films of all time: 'We're not in Kansas anymore!'" Her voice sounded bitchy, and she knew it, but frankly, to quote another famous film, she didn't give a damn.

Spike went abruptly still and looked at Buffy incredulously. "A green ball of light?" The honest confusion she heard in his question made her calm down. A little. She reminded herself that there was no point in making life hard with accusations. The most important thing right then was to look at the situation together and find a solution.

"Yeah, don't you remember? We were patrolling, and arguing, and then you froze and stared at this floating green light like a hypnotized bunny. I was trying to get you away from it, and then the next thing I know, I'm coming to sprawled over the ground." She eyed his bewildered look. "And anyway, I'm getting the feeling that you know more about what's going on here than I do," she added in a lower, almost silky tone. "You knew that guy, am I right?"

Spike resumed his pacing but threw her glances from time to time that she couldn't interpret. After what seemed like hours, he finally stopped again. This time, though, he wouldn't look at her. "Knew is too strong of a word." He licked his lips unconsciously. "We just met once or twice at a few of these London upper class parties." He had nothing else to say to her about it.

"So you mean to tell me that we're in London." It really wasn't a question.

"Yes."

"End of the nineteenth century."

"Yes." He turned around to face her and saw that her eyes were wide as saucers. "And, just guessing, this light ball I can't remember was a sort of rip in time or a portal, and because you tried to pull me away, you got drawn in too.

"Great." Buffy needed to sit down. Unfortunately, the cold ground really didn't look inviting. "Please remind me about this if I ever feel the need to help you again." She took a deep breath. "So what do we do now?"

Spike raised one astonished eyebrow. "You're asking me for my opinion? Sure you haven't hit your head, Slayer?"

"Since, of the two of us, you're the one with the insider knowledge… Yeah, I think I'm asking your opinion." She smiled a little in a pained way. The whole situation was completely absurd.

Spike looked the Slayer over from head to toe. "Well, to start, we should maybe get ourselves dressed a little less conspicuously.

Buffy suddenly noticed how inappropriate her clothing was for the time period. "Oh, so I take it Lady Brendall's never seen anything like this."

"Probably not." He grinned. "And I'm cocksure Sir Brendall's never seen the like, either, luv." Buffy didn't miss the insinuating tone in his voice.

"You're a pig, Spike." However, this time the familiar catchphrase came out less than hostile. This time her warring words were more of an attempt to salvage her sense of normalcy. And when he adopted his usual smirking leer, it was somehow reassuring.

"I know where we can get some clothes."

She nodded at his words and forced herself to start moving. They made their way out of the park in silence.

When they reached the first street, Spike had to spend a moment orienting himself. "Damn, I should've asked Brendall where in Hell are we," he muttered while he tried to identify the buildings spanning the opposite side of the street.

"I thought you knew your way around here."

"Believe it or not, pet, London has changed just a wee bit in the last hundred-twenty years." He looked down the street boh ways. He thought for a moment before going right. "If I'm not making a horrible mistake, we were just in St. James's Park. Hmph, when I think about it, Westminster hasn't changed so much. Come on, we have to keep moving."

"So where are we going?" asked Buffy after a few meters.

"Home," answered Spike without thinking.

"I…see. Ahm, Spike, don't you think your mom would react funny if you came up to her looking so, well, different?" She hadn't expected him to stop so abruptly.

"We're going to sneak in, snitch us some clothes, and get out. I'm not letting anyone know I was there! The old lady doesn't need the nervous breakdown." Buffy was shocked by the emotions his voice had grown thick with. Her mention of his mother had angered him. Buffy got the feeling that it had also hurt him. She listened to the protective instinct that stood out in his voice, and she realized that she had heard him use that tone once before, back when she had allied herself with him against Angelus and he had demanded that she spare Drusilla's life—figuratively speaking. Could it be true that, after all these years, he still loved his mother?

"And what do we do after we've gotten ourselves outfitted?" she asked quietly after they had run for a time.

"No clue. I hadn't thought that far." Spike avoided eye contact. Instead, he looked quietly at the ground. His emotional outbreak was already embarrassing enough as it was. She hadn't actually suggested that he should torture his mother; she had only voiced her concerns that the woman might react badly to his sudden ghostlike pallor; and he had nearly bitten her head off for it. He was just…overwhelmed.

The thought that he could see his mother again had preoccupied him since he had first realized they were here. The wish to go home — it was like a leash about his neck that pulled at him harder with each moment — was overpowering and scared him almost to death. It was so surreal. He hadn't even bothered to think about his family for so long, and now the mere thought of seeing them suddenly terrified him. He threw Buffy a look. She walked besides him silently, her eyes alert and darting in all directions. She seemed to be taking in every detail of the strange world she had been sucked into. He smiled when a carriage pulled by two horses went past and Buffy stared at it in shock.

"Did you see that?" She sounded like a small child at a festival for the first time. The London he had been born into was, for her, a Wonderland.

"Yes, pet, I saw. You know, they still have these coaches in London today? Something different for gawking, badly dressed tourists who don't want to cram themselves into an overstuffed bus."

She heard the ever-present smirk in his voice, but this time she didn't care. They crossed the wide street they had been walking along and turned off into a smaller and more peaceful road.

"Make fun of me all you want. I think it's great. I mean, how cool is this? For years I've had to suffer through boring stories about this time period, and now I get to see how it really was."

"Had I known you were so besotted with history, I would have left you with Brendall. Me, I just want to get out of here as fast as possible." He turned into the next street and stopped short at the sight of a house. A strange laugh escaped his throat.

"What?"

"Nothing." She threw him a look that let clearly said she didn't believe him. "Ah, I spent a large part of my childhood here in this house. Behind it there's a garden, and my friend…" he stumbled when he tried to recall what the boy's name had been. He didn't know it any more. "…Ah, anyway, we had built a tree house out of the old oak, and one day I fell from ten, twelve feet. I cried like a baby, thought that I was going to die every moment. Only got a split eyebrow from it." Unconsciously, he stroked the scar that he had had for over 140 years. When she saw this gesture, Buffy had to smile. She had never thought of him as a rambunctious young child who had climbed around in trees with his friend. After what he had told her when she had asked him about the slayers he had killed, she had always visualized him spending his life as a giant couch potato. "My father was beside himself and forbid me to ever play with the boy again." He drew his attention away from the house and seemed to turn inwards. His gaze had the lost carefree abandon that she had grown used to seeing in him. "Isn't it rich, that I can remember a bloke like Brendall who, in all my life, I never shared more than ten words with, but when it comes to the name of my best childhood friend, I draw a bloody blank?"

Without waiting for an answer, he moved on. Buffy followed him, not sure what she should do with the information she had just learned about Spike. She had almost gone into shock when she saw the sadness in his eyes. He was a vampire. Feelings were supposed to be a foreign concept to him. He wasn't supposed to give a damn if he remembered his friend; he wasn't supposed to care who he scandalized with his theatrical attire; it was supposed to be nothing to him, whether or not his mother died from shock if she saw him. But it wasn't nothing to him, and those facts scared her, because they flew in the face of everything she knew about vampires.

"I used to think that the air in this time would be better than it is at home," she commented after a while to break the silence, to which Spike could only laugh.

"What are you nattering on about? The air in Sunnydale is just fine."

"But I'm from LA, and the air there is anything but just fine. I can't count the number of time we had school canceled because of smog alerts. The air there is exactly the same as it is here." She inhaled once to underscore her point.

"Yeah, pet, that's because of all the pretty little coal ovens people had here in this time. Washing the drapes was pointless because two days later everything would be the way it was before the wash, so most people just let it be. And then we also had people's habit to use the river—it's not far from here—as a trash can, which obviously wasn't making the air, or the smell, much better." He twisted about towards her and saw her shocked expression. "What, did you think that pollution was an invention of your generation, or your parents'?"

"You're joking, right?" Buffy tried to catch a glimpse of the drapes that hung in the windows of the houses that they had passed by, but it was too dark to really make out anything.

"No. All that pollution you're dragging around was inherited from my time." He paused when a thought occurred to him, and then shrugged exaggeratedly. "Not that it really matters. I don't need to breathe, so it's no problem on my side."

She rolled her eyes and asked herself why, in all of the world, of all times, and of all people, she had needed to land here with Spike.

"Come on, we have to hurry a bit. If we show up too late, we'll have problems getting in unnoticed."

They ran for another five minute until they finally stopped before a gigantic mansion. Buffy stared at the sight for a moment with a dropped jaw. She didn't know what she had expected, but this was definitely not it. If she had thought of such a house, she would have laughed, it was so unlike Spike. The ground floor was brightly light and she could see movement through a window near the door.

"How are we going to get in there?" asked Buffy in a dead whisper even though she knew that no one from inside could hear her. She felt as though she were stuck in a bad spy film.

"You're the Slayer and you don't know how to break into strange houses?"

"Normally, I don't break into houses, just crypts" muttered Buffy to herself… "And even then, only into empty houses."

"We'll go around the back and then climb the balustrade up to the second floor. There we'll open a window, and we're in." During his explanation, Spike had already gone half around the house and started looking for a spot where he would like to climb. He peered upward to make sure that there were no lights to be found in that part of the house.

"And what happens if someone is in the room…"

"I'm starting to think the time travel's done something to your head. There is no one, I promise you." His tone resembled a rather pompous professor's. Unfortunately, though Buffy would have loved to, it was not the best moment in which to beat his head against the wall. "That up there was my room, for one," Spike asserted, "and if there's a party at the Underwoods, then I…him…then I am going to be there," he called behind him as he took the first step up the balustrade.

"How can you be so sure? We have no clue what day it is. We don't know what month either, Hell, what year it is! God, you might not be among the living anymore!" Her whispers had dropped down into an angry hiss, and he could answer only with a snigger.

"Believe me, I'm still alive"—he winced—"I mean, he is. Or do you honestly believe that Brendall would ask me to say "hi" to my dear cousin Willy if he were lying six feet under?" He would rather not tell her which tragic end Walter Brendall had come to shortly after William Atherby's death. "And then there's the get-together at the Underwoods'. They would always host a big party every half year. Have since their oldest daughter was sixteen or so. I—or William, rather—never passed up a chance to go to this party, until we died. Ergo, we can be pretty sure my room on the third floor is empty." In that moment he had also reached the window of his room and tried to open it noiselessly. A thought suddenly came to him, and he fought not to groan. Carefully, he stretched a hand out to test whether he could enter the house without an invitation. He was astonished when the barrier did nothing to him and he found he could climb in without trouble. Alert, he entered his room quietly.

"Why don't you need an invitation?" asked Buffy, confused, once she was inside.

Spike instantly put his index finger to his lips to signal that she should be silent. He went near the large bed on whose sides stood two nightstands and halted before a device that sported three buttons and what looked like an old telephone receiver. Quietly, he tinkered with it for a moment before he finally turned back to her.

"Intercom" he whispered without further explanation. Then he went to the window, pulled shut the heavy drapes, and the ignited the gas lamp that stood on one of the nightstands. Once she saw it in the light, Buffy was shocked how large the room was. It was elegantly furnished from the large, comfortable looking bed to the cluster of leather furniture that formed a sort of reading corner. An entire wall served as a bookcase, none of the books crammed within trivial literature. On the walls hung paintings in subjects ranging from depictions of the countryside to hunt scenes. Not to Buffy's taste, but in the current setting it was fitting. "One word about this room to anyone, and I'll kill you…somehow." She could hear the contempt and disgust in his voice, and it pulled at her heart when she thought of the man who had once lived in this room and apparently spent a large part of his free time in as well. This room belonged to a sensible man, and not to the Macho pig that stood before her. And yet she couldn't fight against the notion that, just maybe, Spike still had a bit of that man in him.

"Wait here. I'll go get myself something to wear." For the first time Buffy noticed the door that led to another room. It had to be a dressing room because the living area, for all its size, didn't house a single clothes chest or dresser. She had to laugh as, shortly after he had disappeared into the small room, she heard a "This can not be bloody happening!" And her grin grew even brighter when he came out ten minutes later. Upon seeing his face, she fought valiantly to keep her expression under control, but the rest of him looked far too ludicrous.

"I can't believe I used to prance around like this!" he muttered to himself when he stood before her. "How could I have been so dense? And if you don't lose that damned grin now, Slayer, I'll knock you off, and to Hell with how hard my skull buzzes!"

"Sorry." But it was too late. She broke out into laughter. He looked so absurd that tears came to her eyes. "I'm sorry," she gasped from behind her hands, simultaneously fighting for air and trying to keep quiet. She didn't want someone to come investigate. Neither, apparently, did Spike, as his murderous look spoke volumes. She forced herself to pull herself together, cleared her throat, and murmured yet another apology.

"Are you finished?" asked Spike in a dangerously calm tone.

"You know, you need to cover your hair. It doesn't _gel _with the rest of the outfit," Buffy remarked as he conjured forth a hat and put it on. After that, there wasn't much of his slick, bleached-blonde hair to see. "Better," she commented. He still looked laughable, but she found herself lingering on his appearance for a moment longer than necessary. "And what about me? Nothing against your wardrobe, but I think it would look even funnier on me than what I'm already wearing."

"Follow me," he said and, without another word, after the lamp had been doused, he grabbed her hand and pulled her to the door. She wondered about herself when she didn't wrench her hand away. They eased out of the room and onto a landing lined with more doors on the left-hand side. On the right, an elegant staircase led down to the lower levels. Carefully, Spike glanced over the ornate railing to check whether there was anyone nearby. Once he knew they were safe, he took Buffy further down the corridor until they stopped before a door. Here he released her hand and cautiously turned the handle.

Before he opened the door, she saw him stare at the ceiling as though he were sending a prayer above that the room would be empty. At first he only opened the door a sliver and listened. When he heard nothing, he opened it completely and entered the room, Buffy at his heels. He followed the same procedure that he had performed in his room. He shut the drapes, killed the intercom, and lit the gas lamp. The room was the absolute opposite of the one that had just been in. Where everything there had screamed of a sensible, male inhabitant, Buffy knew instantly that a young girl lived here. The colors were lighter and friendlier, a dozen expensive china dolls with elaborate hairdos sat on the bed, and on the nightstand lay something that strongly reminded Buffy of one of her little sister's diaries.

"So now we'll hunt out something pretty for you," said Spike, once he managed to pull his attention from the room. It was exactly the same as he had remembered, down to the dolls that spent the day sitting on her bed and were clutched carefully to her side during the night.

"Won't your sister miss the clothes?" asked Buffy, who had followed Spike into the dressing room. However, when she saw the sheer amount of clothing crammed in the enormous built-in closet, she only muttered, "Forget what I just said."

Spike could only laugh at her reaction. "Yeah, Lynnie always had an unbelievable wardrobe. So, what do we have here? The clothes need to fit you exactly. Pick something out for yourself." He turned to leave Buffy alone with the wardrobe.

"I can take anything?" she asked from behind him, trying not to eye the more magnificent clothing.

"Yeah, sure." He jerked his shoulders and reentered his sister's room. This time he took the time to study the room more closely. It reflected his sister's entire essence, her gentle and loving though sometimes slightly snobbish character. She had been that way from birth. She always knew what she wanted, and when she wanted it, but despite that she had a good heart in which everyone worthy of it could find a place. He sauntered to the bookshelf on the wall alongside the bed. Her collection was by no means as large and substantial as his own room's, what with its army of shelves. However, for the time period it was still sizeable enough, and his sister spent several hours a day reading through it. Evelyn Atherby couldn't go to bed at night without having read at least a few pages. On her desk, he spied the novel she spent most of those hours paging through. Wuthering Heights — her favorite book ever since she was ten. She must have read the damned thing at least a hundred times. It was certainly battered enough to have been. To this day Spike hadn't been able to figure out why she found the book so engrossing. It would probably remain a mystery forever.

While Spike waited for Buffy to come out of the dressing room, he realized that he had no clue exactly when they had landed themselves in London. In the search for a clue in Lynnie's room, his gaze fell on her diary, which lay on her night table. Where he once would have qualms about reading her innermost thoughts, he now grabbed the small book without hesitation and made himself comfortable in the small lounger underneath her bookshelf. Without delay, he immediately opened the diary to where a bookmark had been placed and scanned the last written page. Nostalgic, he looked over the orderly script that he hadn't seen for so long. September 19, 1879. That was the date of the most recent entry. Just corking, a short half year before he had met Drusilla. A half year before he managed to escape this society and its constraints, and its rules, and all of its arrogant, pompous arses. A half year before...

"Spike?" Buffy's muted voice rent him from his thoughts.

"What, is the selection too small for you?" he asked as he entered the dressing room. The scene that presented itself to him forced a laugh out of him.

"How could women have willingly worn this bullshit?" she cursed as she desperately tried to thread and pull tight the laces of the corset by herself.

"Can't get that on alone, pet," explained Spike as he leaned against the doorframe and amused himself by watching her efforts at donning the corset. "It's like that so parents and husbands can always be sure that you bints are behaving yourselves."

"Chauvinist pigs! There's no other word for it," she muttered through clenched teeth. "So what now, are you going to help me with this rig, or are we waiting for you your sister to come home and find us here?"

He detached from the doorframe and came to her aid. "I just hope the bloody chip doesn't go off. Haven't got a clue how tight it's supposed to be tied." He took up the laces and started to work."

"What, you never had a girlfriend that you helped with this?"

"Not that I can remember," he murmured quietly. It was somewhat painful for him to admit to her that during his life he had been dead to women, and he prayed inwardly that she would just let the subject drop.

"Too bad," was her only reply to that, though.

"In case you're interested, we're in September of 1879," he informed her as he gave the laces a violent tug.

"How do you know...Ow! Could you please watch what you're doing?" She rolled her eyes when he began to laugh.

"Looked at the last entry in Lynn's diary. September 19, 1879. Lucky for you. A year later, and you'd have two Spikes to annoy yourself with."

"I can't think of anything more appealing."

For a moment he worked silently before asking, "Do you have any idea what we're supposed to do now? I never thought I'd say this, but Giles would be right useful about now. At least he'd have an idea how to get us home again."

"Yeah, but unfortunately he won't be born for another sixty years — or is it seventy?" She threw him a disgusted look. "God, you're old!"

"You have to admit, I've been well preserved," he shot back with a wink as he tied off the last laces. "So, we're done."

"Thanks." She reached for the dress that she had laid out earlier. "What I'm interested in is why we're here. I can't believe that this is a pure coincidence."

"No?" Spike went back to leaning on the doorframe and watched her dress. He found it surprising that she hadn't thrown him out of the room yet.

"No, think about it. This portal, or whatever the hell it was appeared before you and put you completely under its spell. And then, bam, we're here. In London, not even a year before you become a vampire. Don't you find that suspicious?"

Spike's raised his scarred brow at her words. "Not until now, no, but thanks, luv. Now I have something pointless to ponder while we're stuck here."

"Your sarcasm isn't helping, Spike," snapped Buffy in return. "It's not my fault that we're here."

"So it's mine?" His voice didn't hide his frustration at the situation in the least.

"Could you please be a little more quiet? I don't want to have to explain to your mother how we got in here!" she hissed at him. She shot a look in the direction of the door. For the last few minutes she had forgotten that they couldn't let anyone hear them.

Spike could also do without that scene, so though he would gladly have given the Slayer a piece of his mind and vented his anger, he merely ran a hand through his hair in irritation and tried to cobble together a plan that would get them back home. The situation seemed impossible, though, and he was worried they would be stranded. And he wouldn't admit it to Buffy, but that fact that they had arrived so close to the time of his transformation into a vampire scared him stiff. Had they already changed history just by their mere presence? He steadied himself. No, that couldn't happen, because then he, and Buffy, wouldn't still be here. Then it occurred to him. If he wasn't turned into a vampire on that fateful night in the year 1880, then Buffy wouldn't be the Slayer in the present, and they wouldn't have been together in a Sunnydale graveyard when that portal showed up.

He caught movement in the corner of his eye and watched Buffy gesture with a jerk of her head.

"Come on, I have an idea!" she whispered louder than was probably wise and marched towards the window in the dress that he had seen his sister in so many years ago. Before she opened the curtains, she turned once more to him. "How do I look?"

"Like a respectable young lady," he answered without taking his eyes off her. The style brought her femininity to the fore more so than her skimpy tops and tight leggings ever had.

"Hopefully I won't ruin the dress when I climb down."

"Where are we going, then?"

"To the Watchers' Council."

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